4 Days in Istanbul: Day-by-Day Itinerary

Historic & Cultural

Topkapı Palace

The Topkapı Palace or the Seraglio, is a large museum and library in the east of the Fatih district of Istanbul in Turkey. From the 1460s to the completion of Dolmabahçe Palace in 1853, it served as the administrative center of the Ottoman Empire, and was the main residence of its sultans. Construction, ordered by the Sultan Mehmed the Conqueror, began in 1459, six years after the conquest of Constantinople.

Plan 3 hoursClosed every Tuesday

Religious Sites

Hagia Sophia

Hagia Sophia, officially the Hagia Sophia Grand Mosque, is a mosque and a major cultural and historical site in Istanbul, Turkey. It was formerly a church (360–1453) and a museum (1935–2020). The last of three church buildings to be successively erected on the site by the Eastern Roman Empire, it was completed in AD 537, becoming the world's largest interior space and among the first to employ a fully pendentive dome. It is considered the epitome of Byzantine architecture and is said to have "changed the history of architecture". From its dedication in 360 until 1453, Hagia Sophia served as the cathedral of Constantinople in the Byzantine liturgical tradition, except for the period 1204–1261 when the Latin Crusaders installed their own hierarchy. After the fall of Constantinople in 1453, it served as a mosque, having its minarets added soon after. The site became a museum in 1935, and was redesignated as a mosque in 2020.

Plan 1 hour

Religious Sites

Sultan Ahmed Mosque

The Sultan Ahmed Mosque, popularly known as the Blue Mosque, is an Ottoman-era historical imperial mosque located in Istanbul, Turkey. It was constructed between 1609 and 1617 during the rule of Ahmed I. It attracts a large number of tourists and is one of the most iconic and popular monuments of Ottoman architecture.

Plan 45 minutes

Historic & Cultural

Hippodrome of Constantinople

The Hippodrome of Constantinople was a circus that was the sporting and social centre of Constantinople, capital of the Eastern Roman Empire. Today it is a square in Istanbul, Turkey, known as Sultanahmet Square. The word hippodrome comes from the Greek hippos, horse, and dromos, path or way.

Historic & Cultural

Basilica Cistern

The Basilica Cistern, or Cisterna Basilica, is the largest of several hundred ancient cisterns that lie beneath the city of Istanbul, Turkey. The cistern, located 150 metres southwest of the Hagia Sophia on the historical peninsula of Sarayburnu, was built in the 6th century during the reign of Byzantine emperor Justinian I. Today, it is kept with little water for public access inside the space.

Plan 45 minutes

Museums

Istanbul Archaeology Museums

The Istanbul Archaeology Museums are a group of three archaeological museums located in the Eminönü quarter of Istanbul, Turkey, near Gülhane Park and Topkapı Palace. These museums house over one million objects from nearly all periods and civilizations in world history.

Plan 2 hours

Historic & Cultural

Galata Tower

The Galata Tower, officially the Galata Tower Museum, is a medieval Genoese tower in the Galata part of the Beyoğlu district of Istanbul, Turkey. Built as a watchtower at the highest point of the mostly demolished Walls of Galata, the tower is now an exhibition space and museum, and a symbol of Beyoğlu and Istanbul.

Plan 45 minutes

Religious Sites

Rüstem Pasha Mosque

The Rüstem Pasha Mosque is an Ottoman mosque located in the Hasırcılar Çarşısı in the Tahtakale neighborhood of the Fatih district of Istanbul, Turkey, near the Spice Bazaar. Named after Rüstem Pasha, who served as Grand Vizier of the Ottoman Empire under Sultan Suleiman I, it was designed by the Ottoman imperial architect Mimar Sinan and completed in around 1563. The mosque is noted for the many different designs of İznik tiles that cover almost every vertical surface both in the interior and under the entrance porch.

Plan 30 minutes

Shopping

Grand Bazaar

The Grand Bazaar in Istanbul is one of the largest and oldest covered markets in the world, with 61 covered streets and over 4,000 shops on a total area of 30,700 m2, attracting between 250,000 and 400,000 visitors daily. In 2014, it was listed No.1 among the world's most-visited tourist attractions with 91,250,000 annual visitors. The Grand Bazaar in Istanbul is often regarded as one of the first shopping malls of the world.

Plan 2 hoursClosed every Sunday

Historic & Cultural

Column of Constantine

The Column of Constantine is a monumental column commemorating the dedication of Constantinople by Roman emperor Constantine the Great on 11 May 330 AD. Completed c. 328 AD, it is the oldest Constantinian monument to survive in Istanbul.

Historic & Cultural

Obelisk of Theodosius

The Obelisk of Theodosius is the Ancient Egyptian obelisk of Pharaoh Thutmose III, first erected during the 18th dynasty of Egypt. It was re-erected in the Hippodrome of Constantinople by the Roman emperor Theodosius I in the 4th century AD.

Museums

Turkish and Islamic Arts Museum

The Turkish and Islamic Arts Museum is a museum in Sultanahmet Square in Fatih district of Istanbul, Turkey which first opened in 1914 and in 1983 moved into the palace of Pargalı Ibrahim Pasha, the second grand vizier of Suleiman the Magnificent. The building was constructed in 1524. The collection includes notable examples of Islamic calligraphy, tiles, and rugs as well as ethnographic displays on various cultures in Turkey, particularly nomad groups.

Plan 1.5 hours

Historic & Cultural

Dolmabahçe Palace

Dolmabahçe Palace is a 19th-century imperial palace located in Istanbul, Turkey, along the European shore of the Bosporus, which served as the main administrative center of the Ottoman Empire from 1853 to 1887 and from 1909 to 1922.

Plan 2 hoursClosed every Monday

Nature & Adventure

Gezi Park

Gezi Park is an urban park next to Taksim Square, in Istanbul's Beyoğlu district. It is one of the last green spaces in Beyoğlu and one of the smallest parks of Istanbul. In May 2013, plans to replace the park with a reconstruction of the former Taksim Military Barracks, intended to house a shopping mall, sparked the nationwide 2013 protests in Turkey.

Historic & Cultural

Republic Monument

The Republic Monument is a notable monument located at Taksim Square in Istanbul, Turkey, to commemorate the formation of the Turkish Republic in 1923. Designed by Italian sculptor Pietro Canonica and built in two and a half years with financial support from the population, it was unveiled by Dr. Hakkı Şinasi Pasha on August 8, 1928.

Museums

The Museum of Innocence

The Museum of Innocence is a museum in a 19th-century house in Istanbul created by novelist Orhan Pamuk as a companion to his novel The Museum of Innocence. The museum and the novel were created in tandem, centred on the stories of two Istanbul families. On 17 May 2014, the museum was announced as the winner of the 2014 European Museum of the Year Award.

Closed every Monday

Museums

İstanbul Modern

Istanbul Museum of Modern Art, colloquially referred to as Istanbul Modern, is a contemporary art gallery located inside the Galataport complex in the Beyoğlu district of Istanbul, Turkey. Inaugurated on December 11, 2004, Istanbul Modern was Turkey's first modern and contemporary art gallery and focuses on Turkish as well as international artists. It is a private venture under the umbrella of the nonprofit Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts.

Plan 2 hoursClosed every Monday

Religious Sites

Kılıç Ali Pasha Mosque

The Kılıç Ali Pasha Mosque is a mosque at the heart of a complex designed and built between 1580 and 1587 by Mimar Sinan, who at the time was in his 90s. The mosque itself was constructed in 1578–1580. The complex is located in the Tophane neighbourhood of the Beyoğlu district of Istanbul, Turkey.

Religious Sites

Chora Church

The Chora Church or Kariye Mosque was a Byzantine church, now converted to a mosque, in the Edirnekapı neighborhood of Fatih district, Istanbul, Turkey. It is famous for its outstanding Late Byzantine mosaics and frescos.

Plan 45 minutes

Historic & Cultural

Walls of Constantinople

The walls of Constantinople are a series of defensive stone walls that have surrounded and protected the city of Constantinople since its founding as the new capital of the Roman Empire by Constantine the Great. With numerous additions and modifications during their history, they were the last great fortification system of antiquity, and one of the most complex and elaborate systems ever built. Initially built by Constantine the Great, the walls surrounded the new city on all sides, protecting it against attack from both sea and land.

Religious Sites

Fatih Istanbul Mosque

The Fatih Mosque is an Ottoman mosque off Fevzi Paşa Caddesi in the Fatih district of Istanbul, Turkey. The original mosque was constructed between 1463 and 1470 on the site of the Church of the Holy Apostles. Seriously damaged in the 1766 earthquake, it was rebuilt in 1771 to a different design.

Historic & Cultural

Aqueduct of Valens

The Aqueduct of Valens was a Roman aqueduct system built in the late 4th century AD, to supply Constantinople – the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire. Construction of the aqueduct began during the reign of the Roman emperor Constantius II and was completed in 373 by the Emperor Valens. The aqueduct remained in use for many centuries. It was extended and maintained by the Byzantines and the Ottomans.

Museums

Aziz Mahmud Hüdayi Vakfı Gazanfer Ağa Medresesi Eğitim ve Kültür Merkezi

The Aziz Mahmud Hüdayi Vakfı Gazanfer Ağa Medresesi Education and Culture Center in Fatih was built in the late 16th century by Gazanfer Ağa, a Hungarian-born chief white eunuch of Mehmed III. The madrasa's endowment deed dates back to 1595/96, and its architect is believed to be Davud Ağa. Today, it serves as an education and culture center under the Aziz Mahmud Hüdayi Foundation and also houses the Cartoon and Humor Museum. It is 562 meters from the Vezneciler-İstanbul Üniversitesi metro stop.

Turkish Baths & Spa

Zeyrek Çinili Hamam

Zeyrek Çinili Hamam is a hamam-museum complex located in Istanbul's historic Zeyrek district. The 16th century hamam was commissioned between 1540 and 1546 by Barbaros Hayreddin Pasha, the grand admiral of the Ottoman navy, designed by chief Ottoman architect Mimar Sinan and built atop a Byzantine-era cistern.